Ohh, the test system clearly uses ddr3-1600... why would the writer/tester emphasizes a8-3850's dominance when overclocking memory to ddr3-1866?

Perhaps the writer/tester should also provide results if the memory is also overclocked for the intel systems... this is one greatly made review but then overshadowed by the obvious bias towards an overclocked amd system.

This is not an overclocked mode, we did not raise the bus speed or tweak any settings. Furthermore we did nothing that cannot be done with an A8-3850 processor and any A55/A75 motherboard.

AMD knew bandwidth was important and therefore 1333MHz/1600MHz and 1866MHz can be selected by default without “overclocking”. What we simply pointed out is users will want to make sure they purchase memory capable of at least 1866MHz with their Llano platform for maximum performance. Seems like good consumer advice to me so I do not see why this needs to be turned into the old fashion, you are being biased rubbish.

I personally think this was a great review! went straight into the details of the chip itself and I have to admit, If these are as cheap as they say they will be, then my next cheap build will have one of these in for sure! thats seriously impressive especially that AMD managed to pull this off, I still have hopes for Bull dozer.

I've been soo close going the Intel Sandy Bridge way for the last 6 months now i've almost made the plunge several times, this warms my heart just a tad to make me wait just a little longer for the FX chips

I would like too see how a lower CAS 1600MHz memory fares against the faster 1866MHz memory that has a higher CAS.
The review on toms only uses CAS 8 on both but it does show a good comparison between the different memory speeds.

AMD is doing amazing, specially considering they are focused to the "bang for the buck" segment (In other words the big segment, yes intel is faster in raw CPU but that is not required for a LOT of people).

I personally think this was a great review! went straight into the details of the chip itself and I have to admit, If these are as cheap as they say they will be, then my next cheap build will have one of these in for sure! thats seriously impressive especially that AMD managed to pull this off, I still have hopes for Bull dozer.

I've been soo close going the Intel Sandy Bridge way for the last 6 months now i've almost made the plunge several times, this warms my heart just a tad to make me wait just a little longer for the FX chips

Click to expand...

Great review Steve,

I have high hopes for FX as well Burty, I committed myself and got an 990 FXA UD-7 while running an 1100T as a placeholder...lets hope the re-spin goes well!

Impressive IGP numbers, I can see these in a lot of HTPC's. I noticed there aren't any ITX mobo's available yet. Guess we'll just have to wait! Sandybridge owns though, I can't see anyone using a 2500k for a budget IGP solution. Hopefully bulldozer will be impressive.

@spydercanopus are you really talking about AMD and their sockets? this is AMD's first truly new socket since pretty much the am2 socket back in 2006, sockets am2+ AM3 and AM3+ have all been rehashes of that socket and the chips didnt lost backwards compatibility until the AM3+ socket, and even that is not 100 non backwards compatible. Intel on the other hand hosed nehalem buyers by forcing them to upgrade if they wanted sandy bridge, and hosed 775 buyers by releasing nehalem and its separate dedicated sockets.

Thanks Steve and TS for the review.
I love seeing new CPU reviews because every new CPU seems to push the bar a little higher, after hanging around TS for about a year and a half, CPUs from 2009 or even 2010 seems old

Can you please explain how you can achieve 31% better perf in Photoshop when you overclocked the chip by merely 25%? This is technically impossible, unless other factors than clock come into play... I'm a bit irritated that this didn't even strike you as odd in your review!...